Dr PR

Keep in mind when people say "accurate" with respect to some rigging plan what is really meant is "I wonder if a ship was ever rigged this way." There was no "one way" for any type or rig, so it might be better to ask "Is there any reason why a ship might not have been rigged this way? Ships were not necessarily rigged just one way throughout the entire ship's life. There are many examples of ships that were re-rigged multiple times. So the "accurate" question becomes "When might the ship have been rigged this way." And the only real answer to any of these questions is "We don't know." Many plans for rigging a particular ship actually come from a model somewhere in a museum - Petersson used this method. But if you follow some of the threads on the Forum you will come across discussions of whether the model rigging is "accurate." Is it original, or has the model been "restored" changing the rigging from the original. Even restored "original" historic ships like the USS Constitution or HMS Victory have been restored several times, and there are always questions about whether the restored vessel is really "accurate." Do not get hung up on questions of "accuracy." We don't know for certain. So concentrate on "probable." Is it a reasonable way to rig a ship?

Mark, Regarding your measurements in post #11, it looks like you measured from forward of where the bulkheads come together at the bow to the top of the transom at the stern. This was a distance of about 18.5 inches (470 mm). This is not the length on deck! It looks like the length on deck is about 17.5 inches (445 mm). But I really can't tell where the deck planking would end at the bow or stern without the deck n place, but your measurements are pretty close to what the plans give. It looks like the stern of the Lynx/Mosquidobit had a "square tuck" and a "wing transom" below the deck level. Square tuck means that the hull planking ran back to the edge of the wing transom and terminated there with a sharp angle. Some vessels had a "round tuck" where the planking boards were curved up sharply at the stern to meet the transom. There are two types of wing transoms - flat and curved. The flat transom runs straight at an angle to the upper transom above the deck, down to where it intersects the deck planks. The curved version has a slight upward concave curvature from the upper transom down to the planking. The "golette" plan shows the wing transom to be in two parts/angles, both flat. The vessel is rigged in the European style (horizontal short spar on the main gaff topsail, and foresails all rigged to the fore mast top. Chapelle's plan and the "golette" plan both seem to show the upper transom to be flat vertically but with a bit of transverse curvature from side to side. Photos of the modern Lynx appear to show a flat transom with a curved upper edge (taffrail), and a single piece flat wing transom. There are a lot of photos of the modern Lynx on line. I don't know how accurate it is to the original Lynx. The Brits probably re-rigged the vessel as the Mosquitobit - they didn't like the very large tophamper on the American ships. They were dangerous to sail in high winds. Here are some highly enhanced pictures of the stern planking on the modern Lynx. They appear to show a flat wing transom. The upper transom could also be flat, with just the upper and lower edges curved upward in the center - hard to tell.

Mike, The curvature lengthwise is called sheer. It is lower midships than at the bow and stern. The transverse curvature (crosswise from port to starboard) is called camber. It is higher on the center line and lower at the hull sides. The resulting shape of the deck is a hyperboloid. That isn't a nautical term! How thick is the false deck? Is it plywood? I like Gary's idea of gluing it along the centerline first, curved along the sheer. But if you do this glue along the centerline only - you want the bulkheads to have a bit of freedom to move fore and aft at the outer edges so you can mate them up with the slots in the false deck. Personally, I wouldn't bother with the nails to try to hold the deck edges down. Pounding the nails into the bulkheads may rattle something loose. But the nails aren't useless - you can use them to simulate bolt heads. I would use rubber bands that are looped around the bottom of the keel and deck edges. LOTS of rubber bands. I used some 7 inch bands (the loop is 7 inches long without stretching the bands) and doubled them to hold the deck edges down on my MSI build. I used 1/16 inch (1.6 mm) plywood for the false deck and the bands held it down OK when I used enough of them. Sometimes it helps to put a piece of square dowel at the edge of the deck where the rubber band(s) comes up and over. This sandwiches the deck between the dowel and the top of the bulkhead. That seems to apply more downward force at the deck edge. It looks to me as if the bulkheads are pretty widely spaced. Too wide for a single planked hull. I have added extra bulkheads in between the widely spaced ones on some kit builds to ensure a far curvature in the planking. Another way is to fill the space between the bulkheads with balsa blocks. If it is a double planked hull it may not matter, but you want to be careful that you don't gat "flat spots" in the planking between the widely spaced bulkheads.

Dowmer, Lever (The Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor) says the ropes were wormed and served. There are many other lines that could also be served (shrouds, stays, etc.) that I have not served. I don't have a serving machine, and the only lines I have served on this model are the long hook straps for the Burton tackles. If I was attempting a super accurate model like archjofo I would serve all of these lines. But this schooner build is just a learning experience for me, and certainly isn't an accurate model of any vessel. In fact, I have a list of 13 errors I have made so far - and the model isn't finished. I intend to list these mistakes in my final post so others may learn from them. In my opinion there are features of real ships that aren't worth repeating on a realistic model because the scale makes them impractical. Trenails is one such item. I served on three ships with wooden decks that had plugs of the same wood (teak) hammered in over the bolts that held the planks down, and even when standing with these plugs between my toes they were barely visible. In photos taken dozens of feet distant these details are invisible. I don't "do" trenails because they would not be visible in anything but the very largest scale models (1:10 or larger). But if you want to put trenails on your model just to accomplish it that's fine with me. Likewise, I don't care much for serving. But again that is the builder's choice. But if you insist on being truly accurate shouldn't you first worm the lines before serving, and pay attention to the different lays of the ropes that are being served? In the end, the only truly accurate rendition of a vessel is the vessel itself. Any model will have inaccuracies and omissions.

First of all, understand that there is no single "correct" way to rig any type of ship. No two ships were alike. So you won't find any book that tells you the right way to rig your model (but you may find some that tell the wrong way). So look for references that give examples of similar types of vessels and figure how they apply to your model. I second the recommendation for Lennarth Petersson's Rigging Period Fore-And-Aft Craft. The first section is for an English naval cutter. Darcy Lever's The Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor (1808) is a very good book if you want to know more about how the real sailing ships work. He tells how to rig the masts and sails of a vessel from the deck up, and then tells you how to sail it. It is very useful for understanding how the rigging works. Lees' Masting and Rigging English Ships of War is a very good source of information about large square rigged vessels, but it says nothing about the smaller vessels, especially fore and aft vessels like cutters and schooners (the British did actually have many smaller fore and aft rigged "ships of war"). Wolfram zu Mondfeld's Historic Ship Models is a very general description of many of the features of sailing ships, often showing how these features changed over time. It is useful for understanding the nautical jargon. You can find Falconer's Universal Dictionary of the Marine (1769) on line. It will help you decipher the arcane and obsolete nautical terminology. **** I have posted a thread that discusses the rigging of fore-and-aft sailing vessels. I have tried to explain much of the terminology for masting, rigging and sails. You may find it useful. A more concise version was included in the Winter 2024 Nautical Research Journal, Vol. 69 No. 4, page 295. https://modelshipworld.com/topic/25679-topsail-schooner-sail-plans-and-rigging/?do=findComment&comment=750865

Serpe, Take photos with your phone or camera and then transfer them to your computer somewhere you can find them. You may be able to connect the phone or camera to the computer with a USB cable and then access the pictures directly. When you start a comment on the Forum you will see the "Drag files here to attach, or choose files" message at the bottom of the window. If you have the forum window and the file location window both open you can just drag the files from the computer to the Forum window. Or you can use the "Choose files" option (click on it) to open the computer's files folders, select the folder, and then select the pictures. Either method will open thumbnail images of you pictures below the comments dialog box. First position the cursor where you want to place a picture in your comments. Then click on the thumbnail of the photo. This will place the picture into your comments. You can then edit the pictures by double clicking on the picture. You can resize the image and select "left justified" if you want. If you reduce the width of the photo and select "left justified" you can then type test to the right of the photo. Otherwise with no justification your text will go above or below the picture.

Mark, I'll be happy to help if I can. If it is a topic that might benefit everyone post it here. For other things you can contact me with a Forum message. As I said, the Lynx/Mosquidobit is one of my favorite ships. There are pictures of the reconstructed Lynx on the Internet that show how the plans were interpreted for the modern version of this vessel.

George, I planned the gaffs, yards and sails on my schooner build in a CAD program. But when I started attaching the finished sails to the finished gaffs and yards I found that the gaffs and yards were not quite long enough. So far they have all come together, but it took a bit of fiddling and the sails don't hang correctly. The main problem is the length of the cringles at the corners of the sails, and additional length of the ropes that attach to the cringles to pull the sails out to the ends of the yards and gaffs. All this adds up to at least half a cloth, or maybe 3/4. I allowed only about half as much when calculating the length of the gaffs and yards. Another problem I had was where the head of the gaff sails fit under the jaws of the gaff. The head of the sail needed a bit of a cutout. The mast hoops are pulling the sail to the mast, and the throat is being pulled to the eye bolt on the bottom of the gaff. The result is a wrinkle in the sail under the gaff jaws. None of this has prevented me from rigging the sails, but they are not perfect.

I have been preparing things for installing the fore topsail. I made the sail months ago, but there was still some rigging to attach before it could be hung on the mast. I attached the clue line blocks to the clews and placed two cringles on the foot of the sail for the buntline attachment points. Two thimbles were tied to the topsail yard for the buntlines to pass through. Then the topsail was fastened to the yard with robands. Two truss ropes were constructed and then tied around the course yard. Each truss was about 2 inches (50 mm) long, with an eye seized into each end. One eye was positioned above the yard. The other end of the truss was looped behind the yard and then up and over. Where it met itself the two parts were seized together above the yard. The long ends will loop behind the mast and then come back around and through the lower eye of the other truss. Hooks on the single blocks of the truss luff tackles will engage the free end eyes of the truss lines. At least that is the plan. I measured and calculated the truss rope lengths, but the test will come when I try to rig this on the mast! I finished the studding sail booms and slipped them into the irons on the course yard. A block was attached to the end of the studding sail booms. They are in the stowed position. I do not intend to rig these sails. I still need to add some rope on the inboard ends to fasten the booms to the yard. I think all the other blocks for the remaining lines are in place so the topsail yard and sail should be ready to install. But first the course yard will be hung and the lifts and braces put in place. Then the truss tackles will be hung and everything will be adjusted to hold the course yard in its place.

Three plank benders should be enough!

Mark, Good choice for a subject to model. I almost bashed my Albatros build as the Lynx/Mosquidobit. However, the picture of the model you posted has a lot of errors. Whoever built it knew nothing about the topsail schooners of the early 1800s! The rigging of the fore mast yards is just weird! The spreader yard (course yard) lifts are tied to the mast about halfway up the mast??? The topsail lifts are tied to the base of the topmast??? There are stunsail yards on the topgallant yard! The main gaff topsail spars are totally wrong. The jackyard on the gaff didn't appear until the late 1800s or early 1900s. The vertical spar for the head/luff appears to be tied to the topmast and not suspended by a halliard. The peak halliards are rigged incorrectly (not far enough out to the end of the gaffs). The pin rails on the bulwarks are in the wrong places and I don't see the stays for the bowsprit and jib boom. I would also check the hull dimensions. It looks to be too narrow. The beam was about 1/4 the length of the hull, and on the American two mast topsail schooners the widest part of the hull was forward close to the position of the fore mast, and not midships between the masts. This was because the square sail and fore sails rigging added more weight on the foremast than on the main mast. A caveat here is that some schooners also had topsails on the main mast, so the widest part of the beam would be closer to midships.

Richard, How deep into this rabbit hole do you want to go? For an extremely detailed rigging plan for British clippers see Harold Underhill's Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Ocean Carrier, Brown, Son and Ferguson, Glasgow, 1972. Everything you ever wanted to know and a lot more! He describes every bit of the rigging in detail.

John, I was pretty nervous when starting my first plank on bulkhead model back in 1969 - the Billings Santa Maria. The instructions were very sketchy and I didn't have the Model Ship World Forum for advice! But I got the job done and it still looks pretty good today. Here is a tip for planking - go down a bit to see my "plank bending" tool in action. https://modelshipworld.com/topic/37060-uss-cape-msi-2-by-dr-pr-148-inshore-minesweeper/?do=findComment&comment=1075263 The little Mini Iron II (Clover No. 9100) is a quilting iron for seams. I saw it mentioned in another post on the Forum as a plank bending tool. But it is also perfect for ironing sail tablings, linings and bolt ropes after they have been glued. It is less cumbersome than a large iron and the small tip gets into tight spaces. It is basically a 40 Watt/120 Volt soldering iron with specialized ironing tips. It has three heat levels, low (200F/105C), medium (390F/200C) and high(580F/295C). They recommend the low setting for silk. It is on sale on Amazon for $19.00 right now (normally $25.00). You get a plank bender, sail making tool and a quilting iron all for the price of one! It is well worth the money!

There are several ring lights that are made for macro photography - I posted a description of one here: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/36412-ring-light/?do=findComment&comment=1040024 They have a variety of controls to dim/brighten the light, and I have seen at least one that allows the light color to be varied. But most of them are battery powered to be used in the field. You could modify one to be powered from an AC "wall wart" power supply, or just used a rechargeable battery to eliminate extra wiring. I once bought a cheap USB powered ring light that was large enough to fit around a cell phone, complete with a phone holder. It was intended to illuminate a person taking a selfie or on a video conference. You could vary the colors and brightness. There are all sorts of ring lights available on the Internet. **** No Idea - Pulse width modulation just means turning the light on and off quickly, with a variable on/off timing. The longer the light is on (with shorter off times) the brighter it is. The pulse timing is very short so you can't see the flicker, just brighter or dimmer light. The advantage of this is that the light is operated at full power while on, always producing the same color light whether bright or dim. Some lights change color between high power (bright) low power (dim), and that isn't good for many applications.

Keith, We tend to have high security around nukes - either the power plants or the bombs. On the Oklahoma City our nuclear spaces were locked and alarmed except one passage into the missile house. There was a Marine guard at the door. He had a list of people who were authorized to get in, and a set of ID badges that were issued to us when we entered. The Marine carried a 45 pistol and was authorized to shoot anyone who tried to get into the space who wasn't on the list. One day the 7th Fleer Chief of Staff was escorting a visiting Admiral around the ship and he saw the "Restricted Area" sign on the door. The Admiral decided to go in an have a look. Well, the Marine was a Private and not accustomed to greeting Admirals. He jumped up and saluted and the Admiral barged right past him. He was half way up the ladder into the missile house when he heard the guard shout "Stop or I will shoot!" He turned around and found himself looking down the barrel of a cocked 45, with a very nervous Private's finger on the trigger. So far, so good. The Private did exactly what he was trained to do, and fortunately the Admiral was smart enough to not try to bluff his way out of it. But no one had told the Private what to do after he caught an Admiral!

Very nice! You can't get too much light on the work area!!

Keith, I was in California in 1969. There were a lot of flower children around, but not so many on the Navy base! Our XO, Devine Dave, had a brother who was a Hells Angel or in some other motorcycle gang. Complete with chopper, black leathers and Nazi helmet. He occasionally came to visit Dave on the base and that drove the Marine sentries up the wall!

You will have much better success if you take the time to determine the appropriate tapering of each plank. There are tutorials for planking in the Forum's Articles Database. https://cdn.wildapricot.com/278718/resources/Documents/articles/LiningOffYourHullPlankingTutorialAndFan.pdf?version=1579727184000&Policy=eyJTdGF0ZW1lbnQiOiBbeyJSZXNvdXJjZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vY2RuLndpbGRhcHJpY290LmNvbS8yNzg3MTgvcmVzb3VyY2VzL0RvY3VtZW50cy9hcnRpY2xlcy9MaW5pbmdPZmZZb3VySHVsbFBsYW5raW5nVHV0b3JpYWxBbmRGYW4ucGRmP3ZlcnNpb249MTU3OTcyNzE4NDAwMCIsIkNvbmRpdGlvbiI6eyJEYXRlTGVzc1RoYW4iOnsiQVdTOkVwb2NoVGltZSI6MTc0MDgwODA4MH0sIklwQWRkcmVzcyI6eyJBV1M6U291cmNlSXAiOiIwLjAuMC4wLzAifX19XX0_&Signature=nZK2WLWyqAkPJ9ertf5cJiM05jcybOx8BEiVdeEf-66uM4iP~dW48h2jKOj-YSzX1yt5uyx-hiwq-TnThAs2kj6VzMj0jXrbYUDlR0ef~94Wad78dsD4VYW48xFVt9f8PFE5GhMHEV~wNguKzvh3N~dcT8gGURlZKN3kRbmlc7ZHj1hPv6mCqaGtMOqPjap-kGQ3ubh4rN49cN3W-niqdcMBJUeTs4VBW1H6pR61tNRPLiBdlM4G1BYsH-5MzAkgQe6w4DSnlnz4bruvUXk5CYgh9uTX-zeMWKwPSKX0P-mzSclKmvjswf4Kh6RRNoq5U1TrhcdiXgVgXOS82tnRaw__&Key-Pair-Id=K27MGQSHTHAGGF https://cdn.wildapricot.com/278718/resources/Documents/articles/APrimerOnPlanking.pdf?version=1579727157000&Policy=eyJTdGF0ZW1lbnQiOiBbeyJSZXNvdXJjZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vY2RuLndpbGRhcHJpY290LmNvbS8yNzg3MTgvcmVzb3VyY2VzL0RvY3VtZW50cy9hcnRpY2xlcy9BUHJpbWVyT25QbGFua2luZy5wZGY~dmVyc2lvbj0xNTc5NzI3MTU3MDAwIiwiQ29uZGl0aW9uIjp7IkRhdGVMZXNzVGhhbiI6eyJBV1M6RXBvY2hUaW1lIjoxNzQwODA4MTgyfSwiSXBBZGRyZXNzIjp7IkFXUzpTb3VyY2VJcCI6IjAuMC4wLjAvMCJ9fX1dfQ__&Signature=kFKIMB0KalfS~KkWV1pKZi8lRhpTrKYNAEwcg08LIZEfFffwOC1DfsB6hJQI6jddSNjgcKsW0FmUO14aQ7z3yCAg4PiYdvJbjIMtf5ia5qAodNGn7I~NQ91jBQgC3jKz1R6yhusUKG8jnKTtwT-SnGWKtJIz6eja9e8g5rd48X-zstxjIe960q274kiAXQ7NnGvcW9PFIEXepj-lrlbG-w1l2nflp29fCj9uuBYweaqJWiX2ED4nbo3tuUWyvav2YGkkmaYjGYW8VpXV26x9lSkT~Yck-Db1uhcdW~YQSpDqUalkfrv4Wz9UJsZjBdXj~9LNCvfOzIuqh7PdUVI9JA__&Key-Pair-Id=K27MGQSHTHAGGF

You did a good job getting the planking symmetrical on both sides. However, I am not sure if any boat or ship was ever planked in the way the model was planked. usually the plans are tapered on the ends so all planks run more or less parallel to their neighbors. They don't curve up and terminate against another planks the way the bottom eight do on your model. It seems some kit builders have adopted this "shortcut" to make it easier to plank a hull. Tapering the planks the way it was actually done on most (all?) vessels is MUCH harder. If the hull is to be caulked, sanded smooth and painted, with none of the plank seams visible, I guess it doesn't matter. But with time and the swelling and shrinking of the wood with changing humidity the plank seams will become visible.

Per, Thanks. There is a bit noire progress to report. I have started rigging the fore mast, and that called for a review of the belaying plan. That revealed a few missing elements - a few eye bolts on deck, a change of a couple lines, and calculations of line lengths. I attached sheets and halliard blocks to the fore sails . The length of the sling for the fore course yard was adjusted so it didn't hang too low and ride on the parrals for the fore gaff. But it had to hang low enough for me to rig the truss luff tackle below the trestletrees. But the main time sink has been rigging 31 more hanks to the fore stay, jib stay and outer jib stay. That was tedious work. As before I put the model on its side so the stays would not be running vertical. Here you can see the last bunch of hanks tied to the outer jib stay. I needed to get all the hanks on the stays before I started rigging the fore course yard and the fore topsail yard and sail. With these in place on the mast I wouldn't be able to put the model on its side.. I slip the hank over the stay and then squeeze the legs together with forceps so the hank cannot slip off the stay. Then I tie the knots around the "X" of the hank. The long ends of the line are weighted down with small clamps. Then a drop of white glue is applied to the knots to hold everything in place. After the glue sets the clamps are removed. You can see how much the weight of 11 clamps pulls down the stay. But when the clamps were removed the stay pulled back taut. After rigging 40 hanks it became pretty easy to do each one. Still, it took 45 minutes to tie eleven hanks, or about four minutes each. There are four knots on each hank. Now that the hanks are in place I need to decide what to rig next. There are a lot of lines on the fore mast, and no matter what order I select to add the sails each one will be in the way of rigging the next one! I have decided I will not rig the fore course. I will rig the fore staysail, and that would not be flown when the course was rigged. The yard will be there to serve as the spreader for the topsail, with all the yard rigging. But I probably won't try to rig any of the fore course sail lines. That will relieve the line congestion around the mast. I did find an interesting note while researching fore sail rigging. The fore staysail wasn't used on most merchant vessels, but was mainly used on warships.

Interesting question. I have heard that also, but have never seen a reference. I have always thought that the foot of the mast rested in a fixed mast step, so that end couldn't move without removing the mast and rebuilding the step. There is some space around the mast at the "partners" - where the mast passes through the main deck. This space is filled with wedges to fix the mast in place. I suppose by using thick and thin wedges properly spaced around the opening the angle of the mast could be varied a bit, both fore and aft (rake) and side to side. I can see where this might change the angle of the rake by a degree or two. Again, I think this would have to be done in port. All of the stays and shrouds would have to be loosened and adjusted, and you wouldn't want that to happen at sea!

Another publication I have found useful is George Campbell's The Neophyte Shipmodeller's Jackstay, Model Shipways Co., Inc., Bogota New Jersey, 1962. This 60 page booklet was intended to be an introduction to ship modelling for beginners. It doesn't describe any vessel in particular, but has a lot of bits of information about things found on sailing ships with many illustrations. I have found it useful as an illustrated "dictionary" for nautical terms.

Mark, Here is a list of the most useful books I have found for topsail schooners. Some time back I posted this list in the topsail schooner rigging article: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/25679-topsail-schooner-sail-plans-and-rigging/?do=findComment&comment=750865 1. To me the most important reference is Howard Chapelle's The Baltimore Clipper (Edward M. Sweetman Co., New York, USA, 1968). It has a lot of information about the development of topsail schooners and lots of drawings and illustrations. More importantly, it lists the dimensions of actual vessels in the early 1800s. It has many sail plan drawings, but says little about the rigging. 2. The Global Schooner by Karl Heinz Marquardt, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland, USA, published by Conway Maritime Press, London, 2003. This book is devoted to the history and construction of schooners. It has an exhaustive history of the schooner rig - the best I have seen. The book has very detailed chapters on masts and rigging with detailed drawings. Numerous tables in the appendices give rules and dimensions for mast, spars and rigging. It is the most complete text on schooner rigging that I have found. It is a large book (11.6 x 10 inches, 294 x 254 mm) with 239 pages containing many detailed drawings, full page ship plans and illustrations. 3. Lennarth Peterson's Rigging Fore-and-Aft Craft (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland, USA, 2015) has a section on topsail schooners, and most of this also applies to straight fore-and-aft schooners. He has drawings showing just about every possible line you could have on a schooner. 4. Howard Chapelle's The American Fishing Schooners 1825-1935 (W. W. Norton & Company, New York and London, 1973, 690 pages) is a must if you are interested in these schooners. It gives the history of these ships. However, it has a 371 page "Notebook" with very detailed drawings and descriptions of just about every part of schooner structure and rigging, and much of it applies to all schooners. 5. John Leather's The Gaff Rig Handbook (Wooden Boat Books, Brooklyn, Maine, USA, 2001) gives a lot of detail for rigging modern fore-and-aft yachts and racing boats, but much of this isn't very useful for 19th century and earlier vessels. However, he does give the history of the development of different types of rigs, mainly focusing on British vessels. But the book doesn't have a useful index and finding information about a particular rigging detail is like looking for a needle in a haystack. 6. Harold Underhill's Sailing Ship Rigs and Rigging (Brown, Son & Ferguson, Glasgow, Scotland, 1969) has general sail plans for many types of ships and boats but not much about the actual rigging. But it does have a useful glossary. 7. An excellent reference for the development of fast sailing ships is Howard Chapelle's The Search for Speed Under Sail (W. W. Norton & Company, New York, USA, and London, Great Britain, 1967). It has some sail plans for schooners and a few rigging diagrams. 8. I also have Underhill's Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Oceanic Carrier (Brown, Son & Ferguson, Glasgow, Scotland, 1972). It is an excellent book with a tremendous amount of detail about sails and rigging. It is mostly for British clipper ships, but it has a section on schooners. Unfortunately the drawings seem to be scattered randomly through the book and are rarely anywhere near the text that refers to them. But it does have a list of drawings after the table of contents. Most of what he writes about are rigs of the last half of the 19th century and early 20th century. If you are interested in clipper ships this is a must have! It has perhaps the best and most inclusive index of any book I have seen, with links to descriptions of every part of the ship. 9. James Lees' The Masting and Rigging of English Ships of War 1625 - 1860 (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland, USA, 1990) is almost entirely about larger square riggers. However it does give a lot of detail about parts of rigging that does apply to schooners. More importantly, it tells how to determine the dimensions of spars, rigging, blocks and such based upon the mast diameter, and has lots of tables. But some caution is necessary because fore-and-aft rigs are much lighter than square rigs, and mast diameters are usually smaller for schooners. And the text can be confusing because he often fails to explain exactly what dimensions he is referring to. Mast and spar dimensions are usually diameters but rope dimensions are circumferences. Divide by PI (3.14159) to get the rope diameter. The biggest problem I have had is all the nautical jargon these authors use, usually without any glossary. And different authors use different arcane terms for the same things. Some authors think a work cannot be scholarly unless it is written so an ordinary person cannot understand it, and use "five dollar words" where a "nickel" word would do just as well. I have found three books indispensable for translating the nautical jargon into meaningful explanations: 10. The Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor by Darcy Lever in 1808 (reprinted by Algrove Publishing Ltd., Ottowa, Ontario, Canada, 2000) tells the novice officer or seaman how to rig a ship - every detail of how to put all the pieces of the masts and rigging together. It is essentially an illustrated glossary of nautical terms and a how-to book. But there isn't a lot specifically about fore-and-aft rigs. 11. The Art of Rigging by George Biddlecombe, 1925 (reprinted by Echo Point Books & Media, LLC., Brattleboro, Vermont, USA, 2016) is based upon David Steel's 1794 The Elements and Practice of Rigging and Seamanship. It has an excellent glossary and many illustrations. Again, not much about schooners. You can find Steel's original book on line as a PDF file. 12. A good general reference is Wolfram zu Mondfeld's Historic Ship Models (Sterling Publishing Co., Inc., New York, USA, 1989) although it is oriented to square rigged ships and doesn't have much to say about schooners. But it has a tremendous amount of detail about all parts of wooden ships and a lot of the history of different configurations. It has lots of diagrams and text describing the parts of ships' hulls, rigging, sails and such. The book has tables for figuring the dimensions of mast and spars. It is one of the best general references for sailing ship modelers. 13. William Falconer's Universal Dictionary of the Marine, 1769, is very useful for understanding the arcane and obsolete terminology used in many texts, especially the older works. You can find this book in PDF format on line.

Just a guess about the holes in the stabilizers, but I would bet they are "lifting holes." On both my cruiser and minesweeper models the blueprints showed holes near the top corners of the rudders. These were where shackles or eye bolts could be installed so cables could be attached for lifting the rudders when they were being removed from the hull. I also had the leveling problem when I was using the laser to draw the waterline marks on my MSI hull. Things just didn't line up correctly. It took me a while to realize that the bench top was slightly off level!

Steve, I guess we have gotten off track here. But for all Baltimore Clipper and topsail schooner fans, I should advise getting Chapelle's The Baltimore Clipper. It may well be the definitive book on the subject. And now we return to the scheduled programming ....